


His Word

by Tjerra14



Series: Rifts [4]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Cullen/Inquisitor married, Disbanding the Inquisition, Divine Cassandra Pentaghast, Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser DLC, Exalted Council (Dragon Age), F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hope, I mean, Phantom pain, Solas Feels, Solas friendship, The Fade, The Winter Palace (Dragon Age), and gnawed on furniture, damn Orlesians yet again, dream - Freeform, fear of the future, featuring the jug(TM), he still cares, i made myself sad writing this, oh and raindrops, she just lost a hand, she's allowed to be fatalistic, slightly fatalistic drama Inquisitor, which is why biscuit exists
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-12
Updated: 2020-03-12
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:13:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23122285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tjerra14/pseuds/Tjerra14
Summary: With the Qunari invasion thwarted, the Exalted Council soon focuses on its original purpose again: deciding the Inquisition's future, and, in doing so, the future of its people. Meanwhile, Inquisitor Imira Trevelyan struggles with the aftermath of her meeting with Solas, the Dread Wolf.
Relationships: Cullen Rutherford/Female Trevelyan, Female Inquisitor/Cullen Rutherford
Series: Rifts [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1230794
Kudos: 3





	His Word

**Author's Note:**

> While playing the games, I sometimes found myself wondering if the character I was playing, any of those Inquisitors, would just keep on going like that after all that had happened, almost never expressing fear or doubt or even just hesitation. Of course, there are some scenes, but I always felt those didn't go far enough, and soon started filling in little pieces in my head.  
> It became especially apparent while doing my canon playthrough with Imira, a character I soon cared about a lot (surprisingly, since initially I'd created her character to get that Warden armour you get when playing a faithful Inquisitor and judging Ser Ruth), after In Your Heart Shall Burn. The second time I felt the urge to expand on her experience by writing a dedicated piece to one of these-in my mind-gaps was during the Trespasser DLC, right before the end. What happened between the moment Solas left the Inquisitor in front of that eluvian, miserable and with a melting arm, and the moment they walk into the Council, ready to decide the course for their Inquisition? And what happened right afterwards? 
> 
> So, since I finally finished my clinical rotations and have some time (well, to work on a project for uni, but you know how that goes), I finally got to write again. Not to mention that the release of 'Tevinter Nights' helped with my motivation. Seriously, if you get the chance, go and read that book. It's great.

* * *

And His Word became all that might be:

Dream and idea, hope and fear,

Endless possibilities.

_Threnodies 5:1_

Past present, and future lost, we’re seeking

The rapture, we have been so focused on our cage

We’re bound in our places, bound in our ways so

No one ever told us we could run away

Shireen, _Running from Wolves_

9:44 Dragon

They say nothing lasts, and in a way, that was true. Transience was the nature of things. The whole truth, however, was that all things _did_ last, preserved in their fleetingness. And Nothing… Nothing was forever. Nothing was made of death and dreams and crooked memories. It was the magic behind it all.

Usually, it stayed _behind_. Of course, some had devised elegant methods to drag it into their reach. Others, lacking patience or care, had found less elegant ones that left the Veil torn and leaking. The least elegant of them all had been the colossal wound breaching the _behind_. Even healed, its shadow still bled through reality. 

A faint flicker of green stole across the clouds that always seemed to accompany the scar the Breach had left and settled down in a droplet. On its way west, it made itself comfortable, refusing to leave its new home even when the droplet grew into a drop and finally broke away from its companions.

The fall was a blur of grey and green and blue, and the drop stretched in anticipation of the impact on the balustrade that would mark the end of its journey. It never came. Trembling as it reverted to its original form, the drop came to rest a few feet away from the marble, hanging in the air. Inside, the flicker found itself caught in the gaze of wild eyes.

They belonged to a tired pale face framed by tousled hair, a distorted reflection in the water, leaning in to get a better look. Imira blinked.

The flicker was still there.

 _The Fade._ Even here, out in the magnificent serenity of the gardens, surrounded by marble and flowers and gnarly exotic trees, it still seeped through the Orlesian splendour they’d tried to cover the ruins they’d built over with. Even here, as far away from the eluvians, the Crossroads, as she could get…

Maybe it was still not far enough. Maybe she should’ve left the palace altogether, taken her horse and ridden out into the plains, away and away, but to where?

_They wouldn’t have let me go, anyway. Not on my own. Not to nowhere._

Imira sighed. She couldn’t even remember how she got here. Of course, she remembered the way, in theory, but she didn’t remember walking it. There had been a room filled with people, or had it been outside, their silhouettes illuminated by the blueish light of the eluvian? Or had it been the Fade, the Crossroads, statues in no-man’s-land? No, not no-man’s-land. _His_ land. His statues. His Fade.

It didn’t matter how she found her way into the gardens. It didn’t matter who those people had been, the ones she’d walked away from, and who were now undoubtedly looking for her, as they always were. The rain had brought the Fade into the waking world again, and _nothing_ mattered.

“You’re giving up, my friend.”

She whirled around to find him standing underneath one of those gnarly trees, inspecting a jug someone had placed on a coffee table. Just like so often, she’d not heard him approach.

“No,” she breathed incredulously.

Ignoring her protest, he raised the jug and sniffed it. 

“Tea,” he said, disgusted. “And elfroot, of all things.”

For a moment, Imira was inclined to believe him an apparition, her tired mind giving in to the strain the last days had posed, but as he stepped up to her, the fading sunlight glinting on his armour, she couldn’t deny he was undoubtedly corporeal.

As corporeal as he had been back there, surrounded by lives trapped in stone, allowing her a glimpse of what was to come. Issuing a warning. 

“It won’t cure your pain, you know.”

_Nothing matters._

“It has helped before.”

Solas chuckled. “I walk the Fade, Inquisitor. I have seen the spirit that lured you to Ostwick, I have seen the damage it preyed upon. The damage it caused.”

“It was killed.” 

“There are more like it,” he said, balancing the raindrop on the tip of his finger. Inside, the flicker twisted and turned, grew ranks seeking Solas’ hand, and as they found it, died in a flash. There was a faint tremble in the air, remnants of an earthquake far beyond the Veil maybe, prickling on Imira’s skin. The raindrop collapsed into a wet smear on the elf’s fingers. “These spirits never left you, they circle, watch and wander as you sleep. In your despair, they find their names. And so I found you. A beacon still, not hope but sorrow, an emptiness, a yearning left untended. Your grief is an abyss. You can’t kill them, Inquisitor. You can only make them leave, lose interest. Dream, my friend. Fill the emptiness with your hopes and sorrows, cross the abyss and walk on into the future.”

His words echoed in her head, intermingled with those she’d heard before, kneeling in front of that eluvian, before him. Before the truth. _The future. A few years of relative peace._

“There is none,” she said weakly. “You said so yourself.”

“That is not true,” replied Solas, and there was an urgency hiding beneath the gentleness of his voice, as if he’d made that argument before. “You can’t have eternity, but you still have time. Time to live, time to saviour. Time to try stopping me.” He smiled sadly. “Because of course, you will try.”

Maybe that had been the most baffling thing about it all: He’d allowed her to find him, allowed her questions. Solas could’ve dismissed her as easily as he’d fended off his attackers, and yet he hadn’t. He’d seen her fight demons, dragons and a self-proclaimed god, and prevail despite the odds. His honesty could only mean one thing: he knew she couldn’t stop him. Unless…

The caring in his eyes tore through her heart.

Unless he _wanted_ to be stopped.

“I can’t,” whispered Imira, tasting salt on her lips. “You know I can’t.”

“You have done the impossible before. Maybe you will be able to do it again.” Despite his best efforts, the darkness of his disbelief, the resignation to his power, still trickled through his hopeful words. “We won’t know if you stop here, will we?”

_Dream, my friend._

It was just as much a dream of his than it was supposed to be hers. He had to believe there was still something good in this world, in _him_ , a chance that the road he’d chosen took a turn he didn’t know of yet. A chance that he could be redeemed.

“And if I succeed, what then?” she asked and wiped away the tears. “Will you just kill me regardless? Turn me into another one of your statues? Add me to your museum of enemies?”

“If you succeed, Inquisitor, we will meet again, and I will apologise to you. You have my word. But until then, go. Go and have the life you’ve always dreamt of. It’s yours.”

With that, he left her standing at the balustrade, watching him pass the tree and the coffee table beneath it just like he’d done when he’d came here, and among the flowers and bushes his silhouette threatened to disappear.

_Vanishing as quietly as he had come._

“Solas,” she called after him, and he paused, tilting his head. “How did you get here? Even with all your agents, you shouldn’t have been able to get to me unseen.”

His answer was a twitch in his shoulders, a jolt in his feet, as if he considered to leave without a further word. It wouldn’t be the first time, either—he’d done it whenever he’d felt her questions were too inquisitive, and it had taken Imira most of the year they worked and fought together to successfully tiptoe the fine line between interest and intrusion.

“No, I shouldn’t,” he said with his back to her.

“Then how come you are here?”

The twitch spread throughout his torso, the jolt gripped his legs, and he turned. Solas smiled slightly.

“You know how,” he said. “But still you refuse to see. As you always have.”

Imira fought to confine her protest to the inside and lost to a frown. It’d never made much sense to argue. Even if he’d indulged her, he’d done it with an air of arrogance around him, refusing to even try to understand her point of view. In his mind, the world’s chaos fell into place in simple patterns. Any argument from someone who didn’t, couldn’t, recognise them would inevitably prove worthless.

She seemed little more than a child to him, stumbling about the edges of the great picture, and whenever she caught a glimpse of its incomprehensible shapes and colours, she found some part of her agreed. There’d been a flash of green in the corner of her eyes, and the picture of a raindrop defying its fall…

The memory made her look down at the balustrade.

“My hand,” she said slowly, turning it upwards and staring at her left palm in wonder. The skin was soft and unbroken, and in the absence of the Mark it seemed unreal, as if the hand was a remnant of the past. Or a dream.

“This is the Fade,” she realised.

He faded with a smile, in a gentle breeze rustling in the leaves of the tree, and when he was gone, only a small flicker of green lazily sailing down from where he stood onto the coffee table indicated he’d been there at all.

The air trembled again, another earthquake in the distance, and the jug shattered into little pieces.

The room was dark save for the faint glow the embers in the fireplace still emitted. It must’ve been at least morning, however, Imira concluded from the bright line a gap in the curtains drew on the floor. A snap of her fingers, and the embers’ light grew and fell on a marble mantlepiece, expensive carpets and richly ornamented furniture, glittering with the reflection of the flames. Finally, it reached a young elven woman, seeming noticeably out of place in her shabby garments, and the shards and the tray to her feet as well as the puddle of liquid slowly forming around them.

“Your Worship,” she whispered, avoiding her gaze. “I’m sorry for waking you.”

She wasn’t a soldier, but still wore a sash in Inquisition colours like Imira had seen other servants do to distinguish themselves from the Orlesian ones who were swarming the palace. Initially, an unsmiling Orlesian had been assigned to her, but he quickly got into an argument with Cullen about allowing “that filthy dog” into their quarters. Afterwards, Josephine had made sure only their own would see to their needs, and Biscuit spent the next days chewing through mahogany chairs in approval. 

_Biscuit._ The mabari was nowhere to be seen. He’d been around, Imira was sure. She remembered blurred shadows dancing on the wall, indistinct voices circling her, the taste of elfroot on her tongue and something heavy lying down on her stomach and legs, the warmth of his fur underneath her fingers guiding her away from the fire consuming her, and back to sleep. The pain was gone now, but so was everyone else.

“What—what time is it?”

“Almost midday, Your Worship,” the servant answered. “You’ve been fading in and out of consciousness for three days. The healer said you should wake soon, however, and so they sent me—” She fell silent.

“They,” echoed Imira. “Where is everyone?”

“At the council meeting,” the elf said quietly, still not looking up.

Her surprise quickly turned into irritation when Imira realised the news. They had paused the council when it became evident they couldn’t hide the threat anymore, and between the fights and the rapidly worsening Mark she’d nearly forgotten why they’d come here in the first place. Now that the immediate danger was over, the nobles had grown impatient again.

_Maker’s breath, you’d think they at least would be somewhat grateful they don’t have to figure out the Qun yet._

“So, they’ve begun without me.”

“You were still asleep, Your Worship.”

In a way, she understood them. It was far easier to argue against the Inquisition if she wasn’t there. She knew some of them were sympathetic towards the idea of abolishing the organisation altogether, as the loudest voices demanded, but were too intimidated by her presence to speak up. After all, they knew she’d saved them: from the Breach, from Corypheus, from the Qunari. They knew she’d given them the luxury of that argument in the first place.

“And you weren’t sent to wake me, either.”

“The healer said you need rest, so I was to bring your medicine—” The servant grimaced and gestured towards the puddle at her feet.

“I see.”

“I’m so—so sorry, my lady,” the elf sputtered nervously and scrambled on the floor, trying to dry up the liquid and pick up the remnants of the mug at the same time. “I can—I will bring you a new jug at once.”

Imira swung her legs over the edge of the bed and smiled at her reassuringly. “It’s alright,” she said, and, with the unmistakeable smell of elfroot and blood lotus clinging to her nostrils, added, “I think I might’ve slept enough, anyways.” 

The floor seemed to sway beneath her feet when she got up, and from the corner of her eyes, she could see familiar darkness creeping in, the herald of unconsciousness. Gritting her teeth, she supported herself on the nearest bedpost and waited for the nausea to subside. Then, she went over to her trunk and reached for a clean shirt.

The stump of her left arm swung uselessly from her shoulder, protesting the sudden motion with a sharp pang of pain. She swore under her breath.

“Your Worship?”

“I’m fine,” Imira groaned. “I just made a…wrong movement.”

The fire erupting in her left side quickly made her realise _every_ movement was a wrong one, and one involving the arm especially so. Even though it ended above the elbow, she could feel her forearm, her hand burning, every finger its own blaze as if the Mark was still there. It took all her self-control not to scream.

Suddenly, the servant was there. The woman wordlessly offered her the shirt, helped her into a pair of trousers and boots, buttoned up the jacket and bound the sash for her. Up close, Imira found she looked somewhat familiar. As servants came and went, she’d never managed to get to know them all, but those who stayed weren’t strangers for too long.

 _I’ve seen her before._ _But where?_

“What’s your name?” she asked when the pain finally started to let up, wincing when the elf rolled up the empty sleeve.

“Vetriel,” the woman said.

Impossible. Of the few Dalish who’d joined the Inquisition, nearly all of them had been assigned to Leliana’s scouts or the army, where their skills had proven invaluable to the cause. Not so Vetriel, however, whose vallaslin had always made her stand out from the other elven servants, who grew up in the city. But the elf in front of her wasn’t wearing a vallaslin.

 _Maybe she’s new after all_ , she decided, thanking her for her help and then dismissing her. _There must be more than one Vetriel in the world._

Still, it didn’t quite make sense. Something tugged at her mind, producing the memory of an elven mural, like the ones in Skyhold’s rotunda, but on a different wall…

_Solas._

“Wait.”

Vetriel stopped in her tracks and turned around to look at her expectantly. “Yes, my lady?”

“You’re one of his, aren’t you?”

Even though she didn’t answer, the change in her demeanour was enough: where there had been nervousness, there was now confidence, and her deference had turned into pride.

“Do you have a message? No,” Imira interrupted herself, frowning, “he wouldn’t send someone. He would’ve just told me. Then why are you here? What do you want? What does _he_ want?”

There was the slightest hint of a smile on Vetriel’s face. “Nothing in particular, my lady. I’m just a reminder of sorts.”

She vanished as she had entered: suddenly, silently, becoming one with the shadows with a tray in her hands as if she’d never been there. Only the shattered jug remained.

 _A reminder_ , Imira thought, bewildered. _A reminder about what?_

The table at the far side of the room drew her gaze. It was a massive piece of furniture, polished mahogany newly decorated by a few bite marks and scratches, and among the potion vials, salves and herbs scattered on its top the box was almost easy to overlook. She’d waved the servants off when they’d unloaded it from the cart, telling them to just place it _somewhere_ , and somehow it had ended up here. As if it was of any use to her. 

_A reminder of sorts_ , the memory of Vetriel’s voice repeated, unbidden, and then there was Solas again, echoing in her head, _Have the life you’ve always dreamt of. It’s yours._

But it wasn’t. Couldn’t be. The box sat on the table, unbothered by her stare.

_Yours._

Not yet, anyway. 

“It’s the Divine’s decision!”

The guards opened the doors.

“Fitting,” she commented dryly, walking through rows and rows of nobles, who had turned at the sound of massive wood creaking only to fall silent at her sight, stunned. Some were still red-faced from the debate, and at the front, an Orlesian nobleman clad in outrageously expensive finery slowly fell back into his chair. Imira could feel their eyes clinging to her, the painful absence of her arm, and the tome she was carrying. Every step she took rang eerily loud on the marble floor and as she reached the very heart of the room, the seat of the Divine, her voice, albeit quiet, drowned out the sea of whispers that followed her.

“Cassandra declared the Inquisition, now you want her to end it.”

She slammed the book onto the table. Both the arl and the duke jumped at the sudden noise, but Cassandra merely raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. As their gazes met, she could’ve sworn the Divine did her best to stifle a chuckle. Even though Cassandra’s position didn’t allow her to show it, Imira knew she found the council a dull and expendable affair and was glad for every diversion breaking up the endless sputtering of old men with hurt prides. Of course, they had their arguments, carefully prepared and masterfully delivered to paint the Inquisition in the light they saw it, but in the end, their greed overshadowed it all: someone had acquired more power they’ve ever held behind their backs, and now they saw a chance to be a part of it. 

_You’re going to like what comes next,_ she thought grimly as she turned around to face the nobles again, _or maybe not, because it wasn’t the way you imagined._

“But isn’t that actually the Inquisitor’s decision?”

An angry murmur went through the crowd. The Orlesian who’d sat down earlier sprang to his feet again, shouting, “You can’t just place yourself above the Divine!”

“The Inquisition is obsolete!” someone yelled from the back of the room, a Fereldan judging by his accent, and was met with loud cheering.

Imira raised her hand to silence them. They still had enough respect to heed her, she noted with a strange sense of satisfaction.

“You’re right, my lord,” she finally agreed, smiling. “We did our duty, we fulfilled our purpose. I couldn’t care less who saves your ass next time. It won’t be us.”

The nobles collectively seemed to hold their breath now, waiting for her to continue, waiting for her words to sink in. And although she’d thought about it many times before, during nights only illuminated by the glow of the Mark and the pain to keep her company, during days consumed by pointless bickering with nobles she barely knew about minor inconveniences, saying it out loud was different. Her voice made a strange and frightening prospect undeniably real.

“Effective immediately, the Inquisition is disbanded. To those of you who served: thank you. To the rest of you: good luck.”

Their uproar was drowned out by the sudden ringing in her ears. Behind her, Josephine, who’d just been staring at her wide-eyed since she’d entered the room, called out to her but she ignored it. There was nothing left to say. It was over. She had nothing else to give to them, nor they to her. 

She left the hall in a trance. People were yelling at her, she concluded from their shocked and angry faces, but the words spilling from their rapidly moving mouths were muffled and distorted. Someone tried to grab her, but she pushed them away, sending them to the floor. They let her go after that.

It was over.

It was an odd thought: the Inquisition, gone. The world restored to normal, the soldiers who cast curious looks at her as she passed them about to go home. In a couple of years, only their scars would be the remnants of the fight she’d just ended for them. And maybe that was what she would become as well, already was: a remnant. A one-armed mage. A married woman.

 _Marry me_ , he’d whispered, looking up to her with all that hope in his eyes, and for a moment it seemed like a dream come true. So, she had agreed. Like every dream, though, it couldn’t last. Screaming until she passed out in his arms the same night they had said their vows, the Mark turning their chambers’ darkness into bright day, she’d realised his hopes, her hopes, had been treacherous, and the dream had been fleeting before it had truly begun.

She stopped short and nearly jumped when a cold, wet nose nudged at her hand. Biscuit had found her wandering the terrace overlooking the Dales, among the marble and flowers and exotic gnarly trees, and now sat beside her, looking up expectantly. Sighing, she scratched his ears.

Ever since she’d been made Inquisitor, she’d wanted nothing more than to flee that obligation. The future had always belonged to someone else—be it her parents, the Circle or the Inquisition. Now that it was hers, she felt lost in it.

“What do you think, should we try the Marches again?” she asked Biscuit.

The mabari tilted his head and whined.

“You’re right, it’s a bad idea. What about Antiva, then? Rivain?”

Biscuit whined again.

“That’s a no as well, I take it. So, what should we do then? Simply return to Skyhold?”

He barked once, excitedly.

She let out another sigh. Skyhold. It had become home of sorts, more so than the Circle tower had ever been to her, but she dreaded to imagine what it would be like when the others had left. _Empty halls inhabited by memories and ghosts. No matter how much we made it our own, we’d soon hate it._

Leaning on the balustrade, she stared at the mountains in the distance, their silhouettes half obscured by low-hanging clouds promising rain. In her mind, she’d stayed because she was bound by the duty of her position, but now she realised she had nowhere else to go. The Inquisition had ripped her from the life she’d led before, so she’d made it her life, and now she’d given it all up. And for what?

“Imira.”

His voice trickled into the silence of the afternoon. He stood where Solas had stood, underneath the tree, next to the coffee table with an overturned, forgotten jug on it. If not for Biscuit wagging his tail and excitedly jumping up and down Cullen’s legs as he stepped up to her, she would’ve deemed him another dream, or the continuation of her earlier one.

_Dream, my friend._

The continuation of her earliest dreams, come to life.

“You weren’t there.”

“No.”

“You didn’t come looking for me.”

“No.”

“But you’ve heard?”

Cullen chuckled. “Oh yes,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s all they talk about. As soon as they’ve regained their composure, that is. Apparently, you were quite…emphatic about it.”

Imira searched his expression for a wrinkle on his forehead, a frown, a raised eyebrow, anything that would betray his doubts, his disbelief. But there was only amusement, delight even, at the thought of her walking out on an entire room full of nobility, spoiling all their fun. Although they’ve never talked about it in earnest, he didn’t seem surprised at all.

“It was the only option.”

“Josephine disagrees.”

“Was I supposed to just continue and pretend nothing ever happened? The Inquisition’s days were over, we all knew that. It never would’ve lasted after I was…gone.”

There was a pause.

“How are you?” Cullen asked finally.

“I’m…fine.”

He sighed. “Please.”

Avoiding his gaze, Imira looked down at the balustrade, at the hand firmly planted on the marble and the empty space where another should have been. She told herself she could still feel the stone’s coolness under her fingertips, its smoothness nestling against her skin, but she knew it was wishful thinking. She hadn’t felt much in that hand in the end, nothing except pain, and all that was there now was the fire her nerves had gotten so used to, they still reported its searing heat even though it was long extinguished. 

“I don’t know,” she said after a while. “I’m supposed to feel relief, probably, or anticipation, excitement, joy even.” She frowned, shaking her head. “But all there is, is this—dread. I’m terrified, Cullen.”

_For us. For our future. For the task Solas gave me, knowing I would never be able to complete._

Cullen had no words and needed none. The warmth of his touch as he cupped her hand with his and held it was enough. They both knew fear, had seen way too much of it, and they both knew that together, it became almost bearable.

There was another pause, broken only by the rustling of the leaves as gusts of wind heralded the oncoming rain.

“When you went through the eluvian—will you tell me what happened?”

“What do you want to hear?”

“The truth.”

She snorted. “That might be the one thing you don’t want to hear.”

“I haven’t asked you to tell me something pleasant.”

“But believable.”

Cullen’s raised eyebrow issued a challenge and she couldn’t help but wonder what he knew of the Fade, of magic. What he would accept. Of course, he’d been a templar, and he’d seen the worst of it, but even so, no experience of his could equal that of a mage. No experience of _hers_ could equal the familiarity Solas had with the Fade, or its possibilities. The ruins of the elvhen world remaining beyond those eluvians, the sheer thought of what they’d once been had been as unimaginable to her as her survival not long ago. How would it be for someone who’d spent a good part of his life focusing on supressing these powers, not exploring them? 

_Unimaginable. But not impossible._

“You can’t pretend you didn’t already try to find out,” Imira said in a low voice.

“The others say you kept mumbling about the Dread Wolf. About how he wants to destroy this world.”

_The truth._

“Solas,” she said flatly, eyes fixed on the balustrade.

“No,” he insisted. “The _Dread Wolf._ Fen’Harel. As in, that elven god?”

“Solas.”

Disbelief wrestled the spark of realisation on his face when she turned to him, a perfect mirror of the same conflict she’d found herself in when the notes scattered throughout the Crossroads had started to tell a story she couldn’t believe, didn’t want to believe. Just like him, she’d made up explanations, excuses, a whole different narrative.

And yet, when the spark had erupted into flames, she’d given in to the truth burning away the doubts, as he did now: “Impossible.”

 _Unimaginable_ , she corrected him silently, watching him try to regain his composure. When he finally did, his voice still betrayed his shock. 

“So, it’s true, then,” Cullen whispered hoarsely. “Why did he let you go? Why did he let us go?”

_Walk on into the future._

“He still cares.”

Heavy drops of rain started to splash onto the marble, hesitant at first but soon growing bolder, until one couldn’t be distinguished from another anymore. Behind them, underneath the gnarly tree, Biscuit toppled the coffee table. The jug shattered on a rock below.

They made it back to their quarters soaked and shivering, leaving a trail of wet footprints, and in front of the crackling fireplace, helped each other out of the clothing stuck to their skin.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered against his shoulder.

“For what?” he frowned, visibly taken aback.

“Solas. The Inquisition. The mess we made of it all.”

Cullen considered her for a moment, still frowning. Then, his expression softened, and he leaned in to kiss her.

“There will always be some mess to fix,” he said, so close she could feel every word on her skin. “But it’s not ours anymore. We did everything we could. You did. All that matters now is what’s left—a world full of dreams, and a whole new life.”

She couldn’t help but to scoff at the notion. “I haven’t had dreams for quite a while now.”

He smiled. “Oh, but we both know that’s not quite true, is it?”

_A whole new life._

Her lips eagerly met his, and in the simplicity created by the warmth of his hands, his body, she found that he was right.

Outside, in the now deserted gardens, a green flicker died among the shards of the jug. 

Nothing lasted.


End file.
